Saturday, September 8, 2012

The following letter was sent to Father Kouremetis and distributed by him to Father Gilbert and to the Parish Council during our Greek Festival Weekend. In keeping with their promise to keep the community informed in these matters, the Parish Council distributed this letter to the community via e-mail on September 8. The Metropolitan's original correspondence may be viewed here.

I am in receipt of a letter signed by Mr. Dimitrios Tsagaris, the Parish Council
President dated August 23, 2012. The letter informs me that there was a final resolution regarding the attorney fees owed by the community pertaining to the recent lawsuit filed by five individuals in October, 2011 against eight members of the previous parish council.

Mr. Tsagaris' letter requests that I now ratify the election of the final candidate
who was elected, Mr. Yannis Armaou, the rationale being that a final resolution of the
lawsuit had been achieved. In this legal action five individuals who consider themselves members of the community sued the eight former council members. The total financial cost against the parish in the form of attorney fees was originally $56,467.10, with the spiritual cost being far greater. Your insurance carrier paid $25,000 of the debt leaving the balance to be paid by the community. After being given a discount the community is obligated to pay $28,000 to the attorney who defended the eight council members.

Reflecting back these past two and one-half years, I became aware of the fact that
a vocal group of parishioners preferred to believe the un-Christian gossip and accusations against other parishioners, against the office of a bishop in the Church, and even against our Ecumenical Patriarch. Adding to this detrimental behavior, many parishioners were encouraged to give nothing or a mere token stewardship commitment so that they would be able to vote at the ensuing general assembly and to vote at the recent parish council elections. As you know, I relaxed almost all the requirements to allow this to happen.

Yet the fact remains that your community has four separate accounts, which are not under the current Parish Council, clearly in contrast to the Archdiocese Uniform Parish Regulations which state that all funds of a parish must be under the custodianship of each current parish council. The separate funds in your community are the HighTower investments, the Greek Orthodox Community Restoration Fund, the Skedros Memorial Fund, and the Hellenic Community Foundation.

In the face of this reality, and due to a cash flow problem in the community, you are now taking the current stewardship of parisr..ioners in order to pay the attorney fees of the lawsuit. Furthermore, the sequence of events following the lawsuit has caused increasing financial instability, including the community's inability to pay its commitments to the Archdiocese. These important points force me to pause in regard to ratifying Mr. Armaou's election to the Council given his role as a plaintiff. Until all problematic financial matters related to this have been resolved, Mr. Armaou's status will remain pending.

In my letter of ratification to the previous parish council, dated May 29, 2012, I called to attention the words of Saint Paul found in his first epistle to the Corinthians (6: 1-8) which prohibit church members from suing their fellow members. On the basis of this Scriptural exhortation, it appears most logical and correct to expect the five individuals who filed the lawsuit against their fellow parishioners to pay the $28,000 to the attorney. After all, the debt is a direct result of their action in opposition to Holy Scripture. This would eliminate the need to use the stewardship funds of the parishioners to pay an invoice which does not rightly belong to them. To compound this anomaly, the statement is made in the recent letter sent out to the parishioners that no management fees were paid to one of the individuals who sued along with the other four, who controls the largest amount of community funds. Undoubtedly the $28,000 in legal fees negate any benefit gained in this regard.

One positive statement I discovered in the letters sent to me in reference to the
operating accounts of the parish was that, "We were assured to know that none of the accounts have been mishandled .. . " Obviously, this clears the names of the members of the previous parish councils.

Please know that this whole affair saddens me greatly. In my fifty years in the
holy priesthood beginning at the Holy Trinity Cathedral in Salt Lake City in 1962, I have never encountered so much anger and animosity and division in one parish. Attempting to analyze this whole tragedy, only one common string stands out; money! Are we a church or a secular business?

I am sorry to say that even the makeup of the current parish council which I ratified demonstrates a clear division between those who identify with the Holy Trinity Cathedral and those who identify with Prophet Elias Church. Some responsibility regarding this sad reality also rests with our Archdiocese in New York.

My exhortation to all of you is to consider all real estate and all funds secondary to who we are. We are Greek Orthodox Christians who are members of Christ's Church because we believe in His words that our eternal condition will be either with Him in His glorious Kingdom or we will be in the eternal darkness with the devil and all of his fallen angels.

When we came into this world, we found His Church for our salvation, and after we are gone, His Church will remain for those who seek Him and His unchanging truths.

No comments:

THE LEADER WE DESPERATELY NEED!

Total Pageviews

STEWARDSHIP

ClickHEREto download and print a Stewardship Pledge Form and send to Church Office with your pledge payment.

SAYS IT ALL!

TRANSLATION? (Please note the translations are not exact)

CONSEQUENCES OF UPR "THEOCRACY"

The UPRs, as currently enacted, have succeeded in proving that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Having witnessed events first-hand for so long now, it is hard not to come to the sad conclusion that some of our clergy actually seem to relish the controversy, despite any inherent intellect, ability and talent.

Unfortunately this “brave new church”, spawned by these vaunted UPRs, and by this ridiculous and inept notion of the church as a military-style hierarchy, fosters a lack of humility, tact and compassion. It promotes utter disrespect and disregard for the laity, which, in turn, promotes disrespect for the clergy. The schism the regulations profess to prevent is the schism they are now engendering.

A QUESTION OF "RESPECT"?

The truly silly aspect of this ongoing and absurd situation is that the clergy has always had built-in advantage in their relationships with the laity. The collar and cassock inspire and command respect right off the bat - the rest of us, in our professional and social interactions have to earn the respect beforehand. No one hopes his or her priests will fail. The clergy here lately have actually had to work at it to lose the respect of their flock!

SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT

Question: who builds a gazebo and barbecue deck in their yard when the roof of their house is caving in?

Answer: Fr. Michael and his supporters. Surely the Proistamenos-of-Prophet-Elias-only could have prevailed upon the donors to fix the DOME of the church as a means to honor loved ones, before proceeding with less critical projects? Apparently not.

One Year Later!

ΑΙΩΝΙΑ H MNHMH!

FALSE INFO? WE DON'T THINK SO!

The Metropolitan accuses many of providing false information with regard to parish property. He cites that the UPRs state that the parish holds title to all its real estate and personal property. He asks "what is the argument"?

One could be tempted to find comfort in this citation, if not for two other existing UPR conditions.

The first is that the Parish Council holds all control of said properties owned by the parish. Since the Parish Council can be disbanded, presumably at the whim of a peevish hierarch, where has the control shifted?

Second, if the laity becomes so exasperated with this sorry state of affairs that it reduces funding (the only real power left to it under an obnoxious system where the laity is utterly marginalized) and if a community is declared in disarray, or in schism, it is the hierarchy that comes in to take the real property. (This action was, in fact, attempted in 2009 in Charlottesville, Virginia.)

MOVING FORWARD!

"Let the dividers STOP, and the uniters START!"

- Former State Senator George E. Mantes

"The high destiny of the individual is to serve, rather than to rule."

- Albert Einstein

CONTACT US

To post a comment, please useyour full REAL name.

If you're unsure how to post to a blog, please feel free to contact us at tocbslc@gmail.com. We will post your opinions or comments for you.

Thank you,

TOCB Moderators

CONSIDER ...

There is a danger in the amassing of the Church property under one control. As the Catholic Church learned (the hard way) in sexual abuse cases that the the entire property holding will be subjected to payment of a lawsuit. Much better to decentralize!

This is a well-known business practice where corporations incorporate separate facilities so if one has poor results it can be dissolved without damaging the entire corporation. A single store could become bankrupt but not the whole.

AN EXAMPLE FOR ALL COMMUNITIES!

THE CHURCH AND THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

From the Special General Assembly, June 27th, 1999: "First and foremost we are a church (ekklesia--meaning the people) any decisions should help minister to the people, effective, and efficient ministering to our peers. The Church has to do with people; people are the most important." - Fr. John Kaloudis

==========================

«Η έκκλησία δεv είvαι εξoυσία, ειvαι διακovεία.»

"The Church's purpose in not that of dominion or power; it is that of service."

- Ieronymos, Archbishop of Athens and All Greece

==========================

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

- The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

ON A COLD AND RAINY OCTOBER AFTERNOON ...

Today, October 24th, 2010, at 2:00 p.m. nearly 350 Greek Orthodox Christians gathered to say that voices may NOT be stilled or stifled. Of those who attended, 347 registered to participate and to vote; 339 actually cast ballots. Three questions (in synopsis form here) were asked, with both English and Greek ballots provided:

1. Asked if those assembled agreed with the decreed split, or if they would prefer to remain united.Vote: 328-FOR UNITY; 11-FOR SPLITTING

2. Asked if those assembled would favor the formation of a committee to appeal to the Archdiocese, the Eparchial Synod, and the Patriarchate.Vote: 330-FOR; 9-AGAINST

3. Asked if those assembled favored exploring legal action to prevent or challenge the division of the Parish in civil court, recognizing that the option would involve considerable expense.Vote: 248-FOR; 91-AGAINST

THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE IS THE VOICE OF GOD!

Φωνή λαού, οργή Θεού.

Vox populi, vox Dei.

THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE IS THE VOICE OF GOD.

WE STAND IN SOLIDARITY WITH OUR GREEK ORTHODOX BRETHREN IN LYNN, MASSACHUSETTS WHERE PRIESTS AND PARISH COUNCIL MEMBERS, AND THE LAITY ARE HEROES!!! BRAVO, PAIDIA! PANTA AXIOI!!!